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Why Softness Matters

5 ways to do more by being calmer

I was feeling pretty hard-edged for the first few months of the year. If you’ve read any of my recent blog posts, you may have noticed as much.

Oddly enough, I didn’t even notice it.

Photo courtesy Flickr (dictay2000)

And the funny thing is, as an Energy Coach, it would be the first thing I’d notice if I met myself on the street. I wouldn’t judge it – I would just see it for what it was.

And I would realize that with some balancing, I’d be a lot more powerful.

But since it was me, and my own life, I was blind to it. I just kept on plugging away, pushing things into being, getting more and more worn down.

Do you know what I’m talking about with all this pushing?

Do have a similar, innate drive – that thing inside you that tells you to push, instead of sit back and “let things unfold?”

If yes, let’s be fair – to myself, to you, and to everyone else who raised their hand: this hardness, this drive-forward-at-all-costs, is pretty understandable.

We live in a culture of push, fast, go, big, bright. There are very few things around us (save for that yoga class) telling us to go slow, be still, enjoy the quiet, allow things to be.

On the contrary. We get rewarded (in spades!) for working longer, harder – from respect at work, a raise, or even just not-getting-fired; to respect from our peers (“wow, Julianna is always on the go!”); to a personal sense of accomplishment, or at least surface-level purpose.

On the other hand, there isn’t much social reward at all for softness. People (including ourselves) think it’s lazy. Slacker. Self-indulgent. Just plain weird.

In fact, I can’t think of one normal-world reason to be soft, to allow, to let things unfold.

It seems non-nonsensical. It doesn’t get things done. Or so we think.

And therein lies the problem…

There really isn’t a normal-world reason to be soft. But there is a major energetic-realm reason to be soft.

When we are soft, in the midst of all this hardness, we create balance. When we create balance, we are at our best.

Period.

It really is that simple.

Take me for example. I am currently in a business course which has me flying cross-country six (6) times in the first seven (7) months of this year. It also has lit a fire under me to up my game even further with my business. And as you know from my previous post, in the midst of all of this busy-ness, we got a new puppy. Just yesterday I wrote something that started with this: “I am going f*cking batsh*t crazy with this new puppy in my house.” Not to mention, my primary focus remains with raising my boys, which means I have less than 5 hours a day (ignoring puppy duties) to work on my business.

So, there’s a lot going on.

And when there’s a lot going on, I go into “get sh*t done!” mode. I dig in, and go full steam ahead. I meet it with the energy that it’s presenting me. Bring. It. On.

But….need I point out how totally out of balance that is?

When I finally woke up to what was going on, I began to make some down time for myself. Deliberately. Intentionally. Knowing somewhere, in the back of my mind, that something had to give.

I did this partly to calm the hyper-drive-mode I was in. Because it doesn’t feel good to be that on for that long. But I also did it because I know that I am better at everything I do when I am more calm and balanced.

Newsflash: you are too.

It can be easy to think the only way is to push. It can be challenging to bring softness into our lives and into our beings. But ask yourself what you have more of right now…are the tapes playing in your mind soft ones or hard ones? My bet is that they lean toward to hard. In which case, how about cozying up to some softness, in order to – paradoxially – make yourself even better at everything you are doing. Work, relationships, creative pursuits, kindness. Everything.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

Change the tapes that run constantly in your mind to say positive, supportive, encouraging things to yourself. If it helps, imagine you are lovingly consoling a sad or lost child.

Allow for the fact that you simply don’t know why things happen….but trust that they always happen for your highest good

Do a “random act of kindness or senseless act of love” – one that you truly enjoy!

It’s a hard-edged, fast-paced world out there. We have to work hard to find reminders or encouragement to balance that hardness out with an equal measure of softness. Hopefully this post has done just that for you. If you feel like sharing your experience with all of this, I’d love to hear it, and I’m sure it will serve to inspire others as well!

Just remember: that oft-poo-pooed “slow it down a notch” aspect of each of us, is actually the most valuable thing of all.